"...I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me..." [Deuteronomy 5:8-10]

Saturday, June 19, 2004

A Dialogue with Darkstar218 - Continued (in response to Tim's post here)


Hi Tim

I live in the UK and you can call me PTET. I didn't major in philosophy or logic either - I learned most of what I know about them in my writings on the net.

When I say "Straw man", I mean that you are attacking a caricature of atheism rather than what atheism actually is.

When I say "False Dichotomy", I mean that you provide two choices (Christianity is either entirely true or entirely false) when in fact there are any possible number of truths. You ms-understand the nature of the so-called "law on non-contradiction", which states that two mutually contradictory propositions cannot be true at the same time. Therefore Christianity cannot be true *and* false at the same time - but there are still any number of possible "truths" and/or "non-truths" about Christianity. (In other words, you can't just *ignore* the fact that many Christians think that the Bible is not inerrant).

You quoted C.S. Lewis as an attack on atheism. Do you think he had the final word on the matter, or do you think just maybe that other people - who maybe don't agree with your point of view - might have something useful to say on the subject to?

Kant is widely recognised as a leading philosophers in the history of mankind. He believed in God (although he said he had to "suspend reason" in order to) and - hey, this'll kill ya - he believed in absolute mortality too. Of course, your version of "God" fails Kant's test for absolute morality - but then you've not actually told me yet what you think absolute morality actually *is*.

Finally, I am not saying that Truth "can only be realised" when every avenue of knowledge has been explored. (In fact, you are attacking a "straw man" version of my argument).

I am challenging you to support your beliefs and assertions. I am asking you how you can be so sure that you know the "Truth" (I don't pretend to) when you willfully disregard even the possibility that you are wrong.

All the best

PTET

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